After not a lot persuasion, I told her that she could exchange our numbers and take the conversation to the next level.

That’s when things got interesting, he denied and told her to ask me to go to his parents. She said she would talk to them and after a while, the topic died and since I hadn’t heard from her or his parents, I decided to drop the issue.

One day, my father told me some bad news; it was about a school friend who got married a few months ago, arranged by her parents and now, after just a few months, they were getting a divorce.

Fearfully, I sent a message to my friend, who had spoken to me about this ‘nice guy’ a few weeks ago. I asked her if he was still looking for a bride. She called me and asked me what happened. I told her about the incident that my father had shared with me and told her how even though I trusted my parents’ choice completely, I was still extremely scared about this arranged marriage scenario.

She understood my situation and told me that she would call me back. She called me back and told me that she had shared my number with him and within thirty minutes, I received a call.

We spoke for around 45 minutes and he truly was a good human being. We began talking regularly on the phone, for hours sometimes, and if we weren’t talking, then we were texting.

Our conversations turned us into the best of friends and even though we had different personalities, we began falling for each other, or at least I was.

He was intellectual, I was creative. He was practical, I was imaginative. He was talkative, I was a listener. He was a reader, I was a writer. He was messy, I was tidy. He loved coffee, while tea was my to go to. And yet, what brought us together? Honestly, our truthfulness to accept each other.

We respect each other, from the professions that we had, to the conversations that we were having; everything about us fit in.

One day, he said he was coming to Delhi and was ready to meet my family. I was on cloud nine.

The next day, I got a call from my father, he said that he had found a guy for me to meet for marriage. I called this guy and told him about it and he told me that it was alright and that we would both tell our parents together.

The next day, I called my brother and told him everything. He was the one who told my father. At the same time, he was telling his dad about me too. The day we told all of this to our families, he walked about how we would be leading our married life.

I also had butterflies in my stomach, but somewhere in my mind, I was scared. I was worried about what our parents would have to say about the other and whether or not they would approve of this.

However, the way he spoke to me, the way he cared about me and the way he believed in our future, there was a slight glimmer of hope.

Everything came crashing down when his father called my father and told him that our levels don’t match.

I was furious. I couldn’t believe that his father could say such a thing. I was shocked when I spoke to him and found out that he hadn’t told his parents the truth about me, or my family, he thought the conversation would just “happen”. I couldn’t believe that I had put my trust and faith in someone like him. Was he simply just passing his time with me?